The Maverick Conservative

"What do you mean?  Have you gone nuts?  Everyone in the Western World (maybe the whole world) knows that Drew Peterson killed his third AND fourth wives.  How can the MEDIA be "evil" here?"   That is the reaction some of you may have to the heading. 

That is exactly my reason for using this as an example. Everyone does believe that Drew Peterson is a murderer--with reason.  I believe that to be PROBABLY true myself, if I thought that it was appropriate to express an OPINION--which I don't.  Thus, I can hardly be accused of a pro-Peterson agenda here.  Almost nobody is pro-Peterson.  That does not change the many evils of today's media being illustreated by the Peterson case, which are not excused just because Peterson is probably guilty as sin ("presumption of innocence" anyone--Richard Nixon once got "in trouble" with the media/leftists for suggesting that Charles Manson was guilty as sin--do you wonder why I call the people in the media sanctimonious, lying hypocrites).

First problem:  It is not the FUNCTION of the mainstream media to "determine" guilt or innocence, or to conduct a "trial by media."  They now seem to regard that as their function .  That is an EVIL thing.  The function of the media is to provide FACTS, and not to examine "guilt" and innocence.  It is even worse that the media--especially cable media, including Fox News as perhaps the worst offender--seems to think that it is "news" to provide OPINIONS on crimes and criminals through these really evil panels (I maintain, and  will continue to maintain, that it SHOULD be unethical for lawyers and mental health "professionals" to appear on those panels to evaluate crimes and crminals from "NEWS REPORTS).   That is what the media regards as its role today:  SPECULATION--not "news".  The media regards as its function the placing of blame through rumor and back fence gossip.  You just don't get any more evil than that (ask Richard Jewell, where the media started interviewing his employers, neighbors, girlfriends, etc. about his "hero" syndrome that made him commit the Atlanta Olympic bombing--oops!!!!, which he did NOT commit, as he happened to be a REAL hero).  So Drew Peterson is guilty as sin.  It does not change a thing.  This endless speculation and non-news "new developments" (Greata Van Susteren, this means YOU--as I have said before, Greta Van Susteren and Nancy Grace both do EVIL things, and their programs are delibeately structered that way--with the same stuff spreading on seemingly every other cable "news" program).    I think the best way to illustrate this is to use the Socratic Method--a fictional, but instructive, dialogure between me (S) and some credulous viewer of this stuff (M, for my mother):

S:  Well, M, I hope you have not been watching that speculation on the Drew Peterson case.

M.  It is interesting stuff.

S:  Did you realize that there are very FEW relevant facts here, and that you are listening to nothing more than speculation--speculation and back fence gossip which has nothing to do with whether Drew Peterson killed his wife?

M:  He did kill wives three and four.

S:  Why do you say that?

M:  Alf of the panelists say so, except for those defense guys broought in to provide balance.

S:  Do you realize that those OPINIONS and speculation could never be considered by a jury--that merely admitting you listened to those kind of things would probably get you DISQUALIFIED from a jury hearing the case?

M:  Oh, courts have all kinds of stupid rules.  I don't want to be restricted that way in finding out what really happened.

S.  WHY do you think courrs don't let "experts" come in and testify to their OPINIONS, unless the opinion is on specific, technical matters that will help the jury determine the facts?

M:  Well, I know the opinions are not PROOF.  But they are interesting. 

S: You don't think there is something wrong with going on television and assassinating someone's character--ruining their life and perhaps, on occasion, driving them to suicide), based on mere OPINION?

M:  Well, if llyou put it that way...

S:  What's wrong with simply presenting the RELEVANT FACTUAL EVIDENCE, without any "panels" or "experts" at all (unless you have such experts on merely to talk about the PROCESS, and not about guilt or innocence)?

M:  I admit that would be fairer, but not as interesting.  Plus, Greta and the rest have to fill all of that TIME.  No one is going to be interested in the same "facts" over and over again. 

S:  You do understand that there are only a few relevant facts here?  You do realizethat the rest is character assasinating junk? 

M:  What facts are those?

S:  I am asking the questions here.  Isn't it true that the relevant facts consist of these: 

1.  Drew Peterson's third wife died under mysterious circumstances, and at least one forensic pathologist has examined her exhumed body and declared it a homicide--rather than the accident it was originally ruled  (By the way, it has always puzzled me why so many "journalists" made such a big deal out of the third wife being found in a bathtub WITHOUT ANDY WATER IN IT, when that would seem to be just as puzzling whether it was murder, accicent, or suicide).

2.  Drew Peterson's fourth wife is missing in a way that suggests, although it does not prove absolutely, that something has happened to her.  Drew Peterson's accounts of how and why she is missing are pretty hard to believe (plus being at least circumstantially challenged by other people).

3.  A Drew Peterson relative (evidently pretty unstable himself) says he helped Peterson drag out a heavy barrel on the nignt Stacy Peterson disappeared.  There appears to be NO EVIDENCE as to what was in that barrel, if it existed, or where it ended up (why did the relative not know that?)

4.  When a wife/girlfriend dies or disappears under suspicious circumstances, with no easy explanation and without an iron clad alibi for the hunband or boyfirend, the husband or boyfriend is the most obivous and primary suspect.

Is it not true that there are NO other "relevant facts"?

M:  It is obvious you don't watch Greta.  She has "new" "relevant facts" every night (lol--editorial comment:  As I pointed out long ago, Greta had something like 1367 consecutive days of "relevant facts" on Natalee Holloway without getting any closer to determining what happened to her).

S:  Like What?

M:  Well, just on Friday she had information that Stacy told a minister that Drew Peterson killed his third wife, and told Stacy exactly what to say as Drew Peterson tried to establish an alibi.

S:  Did you see Greta Van Susteren ADMIT on Bill O'Reilly that such "information" is HEARSAY, and NOT admissible in evidence at a trial, or usable in a criminal proceeding?

M:  Yes, but Greta explained that she, and Fox News, were not so limited.

S:   And you conside that a GOOD thing?

M:  Well.....

S:  WHY do you think that hearsay is not generally allowed as evidence (with certain exceptions not applicable here)?   Do you think it is just because those lawyers and judges do not know what they are doing, and have not known for hundreds of years?

M;  Well, I don't know about that, but it is confusing to me.

S:  What if I told you that hearsay is not admittied for TWO reasons:  one directly applicable to criminal proceedings?  What if I told you that the law regards this kind of hearsay as UNRELIABE, and that--under our Constitution a person has the right to confront the witnesses against hime?  What if I told you that the relevant witness here is STACY, since she is the person with firsthand knowledge?  What if I told you that this kind of hearsay has TWO issues:  the credibility of the person saying he HEARD STacy say these things, and the creidibility of Stacy herself (hence the RIGHT to confront the witnesses against you--see the previous entry on the use of anonymous sources by the media--anothe editorial note).?

 M:  Well, that sounds reasonable, I guess, but Stacy is dead.

S:  Exactly (probabably).   So Stacy can't possibly testify to the actual FACTS, can she?   She is never going to be a witness against Drew Peterson.  And what the minister says she said (sometimes it gets even more ridiculous, where even what the minister says Stacy said may come from someone else) is NOT evidence because the law considers it UNRELIABLE and unfair.  Did you hear Greata say THAT?

M:  No, I guess not.  But Drew Peterson killed his wives.  I know he did.

S:  Based on the four basic facts I gave above, you--and everyone else--may THINK he did (your opinion is as good as that of these "experts" on these panels).  But this hearsay junk adds NOTHING to the basic facts as to establishing Drew Peterson's guilt, and just represents character assassination (as does such things as Drew Peterson cheating on his wives, threatening his previous wives, abusing his previous wives in non-serious ways, "stalking" his former fiance' and pushing her down once, etc.).  Do you remember Sam Sheppard case and the "one-armed man" in "The Fugitive.".  That was the Supreme Court case that established that too much publicity--especially on IRRELEVANT things such as the immoral habits of Sam Sheppard--makes even a court trial materillay unfair.  Don't you think that the media itself is being even more unfair NOW, in all of lthis talk about every character flaw under the sun?

M:  I guess so, but I repeat:  Drew Peterson did it. 

S:  Maybe so, but the reason for the lecture in the previous question is that we are ending this dialogue here, TO BE CONTINUED on Monday, as the Socratic dialogue betwee3n my mother and I continues on the media practices in the Drew Peterson case, AND the question of how certainly we know he is guilty.     

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